Al-Qaeda

al-Qaeda is an Islamist terrorist organization founded in August 1988 by Osama Bin Laden and Abdullah Azzam in Afghanistan. The goal of al-Qaeda is to carry out attacks against "infidels" (non-Muslims, Shi'ite Muslims, and moderate Muslims), and they carry out terrorist attacks against civilian and military targets to achieve their goals. Their 9/11 attacks on the United States led to the start of the War on Terror, and they have been hunted down by several countries across the world.

History
Ever since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, radical Islamism grew rapidly as many Muslim clerics preached for Islamic revolution across the world. Islamic men were inspired to wage jihad (holy war) against enemies of Islam, which were namely the United States and Israel, according to the Muslim leader Ayatollah Khomeini. In the 1980s, Saudi billionaire Osama Bin Laden headed to Afghanistan and funded the Mujahideen, who fought against the Soviet Union-backed communist government. In August of 1988, Osama and Abdullah Azzam founded al-Qaeda ("the base"), whose goal was to eradicate the enemies of Islam, starting by destroying the Jewish state of Israel. In 1990, he declared war on the United States after Kuwait passed him over with the US for assistance in defending their country during the Gulf War with Iraq. Osama carried out the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, 1998 East Africa embassy bombings, the 2000 USS Cole bombing, and the 2001 9/11 attacks.

The 9/11 attacks led to the world hunting down al-Qaeda, as they were now a threat to global security. al-Qaeda was extremely dangerous in that they operated in every country among the Muslim population, and they were able to spread propaganda through their magazine "Inspire" and other sources of media. They gathered a large following in Afghanistan, and later spread operations to Iraq and Pakistan. The United States gathered a coalition and invaded Afghanistan in 2001, and they overthrew al-Qaeda's Taliban allies. al-Qaeda was defeated by the time that the US left Afghanistan in 2014, with only 40 members left. The US also invaded Iraq with a coalition in 2003, and they managed to kill a large amount of al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) members. The US used drone strikes against al-Qaeda in Pakistan, and weakened them there as the Pakistani Army fought al-Qaeda and Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan allies of al-Qaeda.

al-Qaeda later branched out to Yemen, Somalia, and the Maghreb, areas that the US did not invade. They had 800 people in the Maghreb, 7,000 people in Somalia, and 1,000 in Arabia. There were also 300 in India and 6,115 in Syria, and their number in Syria grew during the Syrian Civil War. al-Qaeda launched more terrorist attacks in the 2000s and 2010s, but no major ones hit the United States thanks to the efforts of the TSA, CIA, and FBI. Al-Qaeda was gradually hunted down, and in 2011, Osama Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan by the Navy SEALs. However, they increased their strength in Syria and Yemen as the governments collapsed in civil wars. al-Qaeda's Iraqi affiliate group declared itself the "Islamic State" in June 2014, and they were so cruel that al-Qaeda disassociated themselves from the Islamic State. al-Qaeda, however, resumed its campaign of terrorism. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) was responsible for many car bombings and suicide bombings in Yemen during the Yemeni Revolution and Sa'dah War, and in January 2015 Cherif Kouachi and Said Kouachi killed 12 people in Paris in their name.